Thursday, August 10, 2017

Sexuality: God Creates; The World Corrupts

God is not against sex, he is for it. After all, he is the author of it, and all that God creates is good and worthy of desiring. In a pleasure-saturated society, we have a distinct message that is more than “that’s bad; don’t do it.” We need to be willing to convey this message to our young people sooner and do so in a way that is clear, positive, and bold.

How do you talk to your kids about sex and sexuality? It can be an uncomfortable subject.

Here is a phrase I often use when I teach young people about sex: God creates; the world corrupts. God creates food; the world corrupts the use of food. God creates relationships; the world corrupts and uses relationships in ways that were never intended. God creates sex and sexuality; the world corrupts it and turns it into something it was never meant to be.

Unfortunately, too often we address the corruption of such things before building a positive perspective of what God created them to be. By the time we engage youth on a topic like sex, it is often packed full of warnings—”why you shouldn’t”—and do’s and don’ts. Sadly then, what comes across is that God is against sex because it is immoral or unhealthy, and a young person might draw the conclusion that it is sinful and wrong to desire it.

But God is not against sex, he is for it. After all, he is the author of it, and all that God creates is good and worthy of desiring. In a pleasure-saturated society, we have a distinct message that is more than “that’s bad; don’t do it.” We need to be willing to convey this message to our young people sooner and do so in a way that is clear, positive, and bold.

And we need to also speak more clearly about how the world corrupts sex and then wonders why it doesn’t deliver as expected. Sometimes I use an example like this to make my point.

There is a context in which anything that it is created is meant to function well. Take for example, the iphone. It is an amazing piece of technology that can do more things than I can name. Now imagine dropping the iphone off a highway bridge only to be surprised to find when you retrieve it from the pavement below that it no longer works. Then imagine blaming Apple for your phone’s corrupted state and filing a complaint that you have been given a defective phone! Do you see how foolish it would be to blame the creator when, clearly, you were provided the boundaries in which the phone was to work and it was you who chose to misuse it?